Planning Board advances two-tier ADU bylaw, continues hearing to March 11

LINCOLN -- February 25, 2025, Lincoln Planning Board opens ADU rewrite, takes first look at $20K-square-foot community center. The board continued a public hearing on accessory dwelling unit zoning to March 11 to await Attorney General feedback on a two-tier draft that preserves Lincoln's existing 1,200-square-foot accessory apartment category while adding a new Section 14.4 for state-mandated 900-square-foot protected-use ADUs allowed by right. Town Counsel Amy Questel of KP Law routes nonconforming-lot cases to the Zoning Board of Appeals for a majority-vote Section 6 finding rather than a supermajority special permit. Co-Chair Lynn DeLisi noted Lincoln has added only 22 accessory apartments in a decade and that "the vast majority, maybe a super majority, are family members." The board separately continued site plan review for the new Community Center, a roughly 20,000-square-foot all-electric net-zero building with 133 parking spaces against 98 required and a new pedestrian bridge to the Brooks School lot, to March 25 pending Rainer Swanson Engineering's peer review.